


Off the Edge

by LavenderProse



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Fictionalized Accounts of Real Events, Like the burning of Big Butter Jesus, M/M, Minor Character Death, Not Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Compliant, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Recovery, Road Trips, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-17 05:25:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4653984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LavenderProse/pseuds/LavenderProse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"Going somewhere?" Bucky asks, like he feels like he's obligated to.</i>
  <br/>
  <i>"Going on a trip," Steve says.</i>
  <br/>
  <i>"Where?"</i>
  <br/>
  <i>"Dunno. Wanna come?"</i>
</p><p>Steve and Bucky go on a road trip. Breakthroughs are made.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Off the Edge

One morning, not preceded by any particular incident aside from the nightmares that have become expectable and commonplace, Steve wakes up and starts loading clothes into a dufflebag. He doesn't really know why he's doing it or if anything is going to come of it until Bucky shuffles in, stands there in the doorway in the combat boots and leather jacket he wears to bed, and says, "Going somewhere?" His voice is monotonous, no particular cadence to indicate if this turn of events concerns him—or pleases him. He asks like he feels he's obligated to. Steve wants to scream.

"Going on a trip," Steve says.

"Where?"

"Dunno," Steve says. He zips up the duffle, now bulging with mostly clothes but also his StarkPad and a gun that he doesn't really want but doesn't feel right leaving. Not anymore. He hefts it onto his shoulder and asks, "Wanna come?" He honestly has no idea if this is good for Bucky's recovery. More likely than not, he'd get mixed answers even if he asked the leading experts on Bucky's condition. Bucky's condition being something along the lines of _FUBAR traumatized and either unable to un-fucking-willing to get better_. Some would probably say that it's good for Bucky to have a change of scenery. Others would tell him that he shouldn't, under any circumstances, deviate from routine. That even a minute change will set his recovery back months.

Steve is done with taking instructions from everyone else. Steve is done with listening to everyone but Bucky where Bucky's recovery is concerned. Steve is tired of living like this.

Now is when he gets his true answers; is the point at which Bucky is free to choose between Steve and his own solitude in as nonjudgmental a way as possible. If he chooses not to go with Steve, Steve will just leave. He will hit the road and leave Bucky to himself and maybe Bucky will run away again and maybe Steve will feel like his heart is being ripped out of his chest and maybe he'll get on his motorcycle and drive it into the East River. Or maybe he just won't go at all, because part of Steve still knows that he would rather die one thousand deaths than abandon Bucky.

Or maybe Bucky will come with…and things will get better. Or stay the same. Steve likes to think that things can't get worse at this point—even though they've been worse, and could easily turn around from their upward trend and plummet again. Still, he hopes.

He tries not to hold his breath as he waits for Bucky to reply. It doesn't stop him from letting it out like he hasn't exhaled in hours when Bucky says, "I'll go pack some stuff."

"Alright," Steve murmurs. Bucky leaves the room and Steve sits down heavily on the corner of his bed, takes out his phone and stares for a long time at his lockscreen, considering who to tell that they are leaving town. _If_ he should tell anyone they are leaving town. Eventually, he texts Sam. _Won't be in communication for a while_.

A few minutes later, Sam texts back: _How long?_

 _Don't know_.

Sam doesn't respond again, although whether that's because he's accepted the answer or something else has drawn his attention, Steve doesn't really know. He turns his phone off and puts it on the nightstand and leaves it there, pulls on his leather jacket and leaves the bedroom, closing the door behind him. Bucky is already standing in the middle of the living area, duffle bag at his feet. It's hardly as full as Steve's and it's a good bet that a majority of the contents are weapons, but Steve doesn't ask what he's packed. He packed enough clothing for both of them to share.

Bucky shifts nervously, like he wants to say something but isn't sure how. This happens a lot, but Steve is usually just so pleased that Bucky even _wants_ to communicate that he stands there patiently for minutes on end, waiting for Bucky to decide if he's actually going to vocalize his thought. More often than not, he just lets out a frustrated noise and walks away. Today he takes in a deep breath and says, "I've never…seen the Grand Canyon?"

The Grand Canyon is significantly farther than anywhere Steve even fathomed going, but it isn't impossible. It's far from impossible.

"Neither have I," Steve admits. He takes a few steps closer and Bucky doesn't back up or flinch. It's enough to draw a smile on Steve's face. "We always used to talk about it."

He's stopped saying things like _Do you remember that?_ because the answer has been an overwhelming no, and he can't take the disappointment anymore. It just makes it sweeter when Bucky tilts his head up and offers a small quirk of the lips—not a smile, not the way Steve remembers it, but it's something—and says, "I remember. I think."

Steve says, "You should go to the bathroom before we leave," and waits until Bucky leaves the room to press his forehead against the wall and sob.

* * *

With Manhattan traffic, it takes them most of the morning just to clear the greater New York metro area. It would have been faster with the bike, but Steve figured that a cross-country roadtrip was best done in a car. Or a truck, as it were, seeing as Steve's other vehicle is a two-door pickup that Tony encouraged him to buy soon after the Battle of New York, what seems like a lifetime ago.

By the time they are crossing the New Jersey/Pennsylvania boarder, it's already way past noon. Steve realizes that neither of them have eaten all day when first his own, and then Bucky's stomach roars in the quiet of the truck. Bucky looks down at his own gut, looking almost shocked. Steve wants to laugh, but he doesn't know how to do that without making Bucky think he's laughing _at_ him, so he pushes down the impulse and says, "Hungry?" instead.

Bucky nods.

Steve spends a moment trying to catch a glance of what's lining the road whilst still watching traffic. His eyes alight first on a pancake house— _All Day Hotcakes!_ —and he says, "Pancakes?"

There is a shuffle of fabric—Bucky shrugging. Steve pulls into the parking lot. It's a small place, with a row of eight parking spots along the side of the building and a few more around back. Inside, a girl with her long and straight blond hair in a high, tight ponytail leads them to a table. It doesn't escape Steve's notice that she glances at Bucky more than once, but she doesn't seem wary—just curious. Bucky doesn't notice either way, and Steve has stopped commenting on such things. Human beings can only be faulted for their natural curiosity so far, and some people have a certain amount of inherent empathy that makes them doubly concerned when someone like Bucky drifts into their lives.

She also doesn't recognize them, which Steve is glad for. He's still not sure what they're running away from, but he thinks part of it is the constant recognition, the perpetual weight of notoriety.

"Would you like to look at the menu, or would you like the buffet?" she asks before she sets down the menus, two double-sided laminated sheets of 12''x18'' paper.

Steve, who hadn't noticed the buffet before, now realizes that there are two steaming tables against the far wall. He raises his eyebrows at Bucky, who shrugs in response. Steve says, "I think we'll have the buffet."

"Alright, that comes with coffee and your choice of fresh juice. We have orange, apple, cranberry, grapefruit—"

"Orange," Bucky interrupts.

The girl is slightly startled, but recovers quickly. "Alright. Pulp or no pulp?"

Bucky stares at her through his fringe, eyes bulging slightly like he's been asked a question he doesn't know the answer to. He looks to Steve, and Steve abruptly realizes that Bucky might not even know what pulp versus no pulp even means.

Following Bucky's cue, the girl switches her gaze to Steve, and he says, "We'll both have orange juice without pulp, and coffee," and waits until she walks away to say, "Come up to the buffet with me?"

Bucky says, "Just get me whatever you're getting."

Steve waits for a minute, hoping that Bucky will change his mind, but Bucky stares at him out of the corners of his eyes until Steve feels small again—smaller, not like a skinny asthmatic but like a bug—and he gets up with a resigned sigh, gets two plates, and loads them with all the same foods. Bucky won't take a bite of anything until he sees Steve do it. At least he'll eat anything put in front of him. If Steve can't get Bucky to eat what he wants, at least he'll get him to eat as much as he knows he needs.

Their juice and coffee has arrived when Steve returns. He sets one plate, piled with bacon, pancakes and eggs in front of Bucky and the other in front of his own chair. The juice is in a one-liter glass carafe, and the coffee in a metal carafe of similar size. He pours the juice for each of them and sits down, spreads his napkin across his lap—it's just paper, but old habits die hard—and pours himself a cup of coffee. Then, making sure Bucky is watching him, he methodically takes a bite of everything—pancake, eggs and bacon, all separate so that Bucky can see—and chases it with a sip of the orange juice.

After that, Bucky digs in hungrily. They don't talk through the meal.

As they're walking back out to the truck, Bucky says, "Oranges."

"What about them?"

"We didn't used to have them. Only for special occasions. Christmas?"

"Your dad used to bring home a coupla oranges on Christmas Eve," Steve says, trying not to inflect his voice too much—trying to tell it like any old story, and not like another piece of his heart is very slowly being picked away—or maybe put back into place. It's hard to tell, these days. They both hurt. "Usually, your parents shared one and we shared one with your sisters. But, uh…one Christmas, we had one to ourselves." He doesn't know why he says it. He didn't have to say anything about it. Nobody would have faulted him for leaving out the Christmas that he was fifteen and Bucky was sixteen and he and Bucky sat crosslegged on Bucky's bed and fed each other slices of the orange—

Nobody knows that it even happened now. Nobody but him. It hurts like hell knowing that, but at least he doesn't have anyone to answer to when the memory rises up, unbidden, of the taste of oranges on Bucky's mouth.

Bucky doesn't respond, line of questioning forgotten as soon as it was brought up. They get in the truck and drive until the sun goes down, and then Steve pulls into the parking lot of a tiny motel in a tiny town in Pennsylvania, pays fifty bucks for a double room for the night, and retrieves Bucky from the truck with the room key in hand. Together, they sweep the motel room for cameras and bugs. Steve doesn't honestly think that they will find anything, not in the Middle of Nowhere, PA, but he does it to indulge Bucky.

Afterwards, they fall onto their respective mattresses and sleep like the dead.

* * *

When Steve wakes up, there is an orange on the nightstand next to his bed.

"Buck?" he mumbles, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

Bucky, whose hair is wet and limp from, presumably, a shower, comes out of the bathroom and sits on the edge of his bed, across from Steve. He smells like the indistinct chemical-clean of hotel shampoo and cigarette smoke and like what Steve's room in their apartment smells like, probably because he's wearing Steve's shirt and Steve's pants. He had a feeling that Bucky neglected to pack clothes for himself.

"Where'd the orange come from?" he mumbles, pulling himself into a sitting position against the headboard.

"There's a bowl of them on the front desk," Bucky says. He looks at the orange, not Steve, but he does look up and into Steve's eyes when he adds, "Was that okay? Should I put it back?"

"Oh, no. If they were on the front desk, they probably want people to take them." He picks up the orange and digs a nail in, starts to peel it. "They probably wouldn't miss it anyway. What were you doing up at the front desk?"

"Late check out," Bucky says, gesturing to the alarm clock. To Steve's shock, it displays the time as being past ten. He can't remember the last time he slept for six hours straight, let alone the nearly twelve he must have slept for it to be 10:15 in the morning. "You were sleeping. I didn't want to wake you up."

Steve's heart does something strange; it feels like a skipped beat, but he knows that it couldn't be that. His heart hasn't skipped a beat in seventy years. He knows what it is, anyway. Bucky being frivolous, being concerned for the happiness—not just the continued survival of—another person; letting Steve sleep beyond what he knew his superpowered body really needed, means something. Steve isn't totally sure what, not yet, but he's almost certain that it's something good.

"Oh," is all he says, as he works his thumb underneath the hard rind and turns the orange around, loosening the peel on all sides. "Thank you, Buck."

Bucky hums and watches Steve eat one section of the orange before handing it over. He sits back against the headboard and enjoys the orange as Steve dresses. Not just eats, _enjoys_ , and Steve can tell because he eats it slowly and with relish, slice by slice. When there is only one section left, Bucky gets off his bed and crosses the room to Steve, who's sitting on the one chair in the room to tie his shoes, and offers it. Steve, perhaps not thinking as clearly as he should after just waking up, opens his mouth to receive the orange slice instead of taking it by hand.

Without hesitation, Bucky lowers the slice onto his tongue. The pad of his index finger touches Steve's tongue. Steve just barely tastes him; the indistinct, almost salty taste of skin underneath sharp, tangy orange. He takes the slice into his mouth and chews, the juice bursting out to every corner of his mouth, as he looks up into Bucky's eyes.

Then Bucky smirks. It isn't a smile. It isn't the almost-grimace of a thing he's been making lately. It's an Honest-To-God Bucky Barnes _smirk_.

Steve can't help the laughter that bubbles out of his throat. The smirk goes away, but it's replaced with a soft, amused expression and an almost-giggle that does the exact same thing to Steve's heart, so it doesn't really matter.

* * *

On a whim, Steve navigates them towards Gettysburg. The Civil War was the most prominent historical war they learned about back in school—World War One wasn't historic at all at the time, considering more than half of the kids in his and Bucky's neighborhood had lost a father or an uncle or an older brother in the Great War—and Steve remembers the slides that they looked at, sepia-toned captures of soldiers long dead.

The Gettysburg Museum/Visitor's Center is centrally located within the battlefield area. They park in front of the center and step inside to get a map, then walk about a mile down a road with the waving grass of the battlefield on both sides. He's almost surprised to see the grass there, because for some reason he's always imaged it stained with the blood of all the men who died here. He knows that's how he still thinks of all of those trenches and foxholes in Europe.

When they come upon the 39th New York Volunteer Infantry Memorial, they stop and stare for a long moment. More likely than not, some of the men from the 39th New York Infantry were the great grandfathers of the kids they sat next to every day in school. As he stands there, he hears Bucky murmuring under his breath. It's too quiet to hear what he's saying until the wind changes directions abruptly and the last of his words float to Steve on the air, "…through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen."

For some reason, it strikes Steve as genuinely funny that Bucky has retained elements of his Catholicism even after all Hydra had done. They both had their ups and downs as far as faith went. Despite a marked lack of churchgoing whilst they were in their late teens/early twenties, war found both of them praying. There wasn't a single Catholic man during the war who couldn't be found, at least once, reciting his Hail Marys. Steve remembers clearly the feeling of being covered in mud, terrified, clutching his rosary and fervently whispering into the dark, tumultuous night. _Hail Mary, full of Grace. Our Lord is with thee._

Bucky, from next to him. _Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus._

What he says now is, "You know, most of these guys wouldn't have been Catholic."

Bucky makes an inquiring noise and steps slightly closer. He tied his hair back in the truck and now a few strands are falling down, but his face is clear for the most part. Those few loose strands are waving in the cool breeze and he looks at once painfully young and so much older than Steve remembers him being. They're not sure how old Bucky is, not anymore. Through vague Hydra records of the amount of time he spent in and out of Cryo—including an almost fifteen-year period after the fall of the U.S.S.R. during which he completely disappears—they've extrapolated that, in lived years, he is older than thirty but younger than forty. Sometimes, Steve wonders if he aged even that much.

"Less than five percent of the population was Catholic at the time," Steve says, "And most of those who were, were immigrants. Like us."

Bucky turns his head and gives a wicked little smile. "You know, I went through a lot of history books before you found me, trying to recover myself. Not a one of them mentioned that we were Irish. Found a lot of propaganda using your face to tell immigrants to go back to their countries, though. You'd've thought they'd know Captain America was a immigrant."

"Well, it's not like they know a lot about us before the war in general. All they knew about me was that I was what people thought was true; that I was born in Brooklyn sometime before 1920. They knew even less about you. Even if they knew, I'd be surprised if it made it into the history books. There was a lot of distrust for the Irish even up until the seventies and eighties."

"Still. No one ever bothered looking at the records from Ellis Island?"

"Nobody probably did. They all just assume Captain America is American." Steve's mother always wanted him to be American. He was born so soon before their immigration to the United States that it was easy to tell people he'd been born in America. She never let him pick up her Irish accent either. Same with Bucky's mom. Yet there were times when they said certain words and the inflection was pure Irish. Bucky used to pronounce his soft a's hard on some words. What month is it, Buck? _Maerch._

Bucky noises softly and they stare off across the battlefield for a moment.

"51,000 soldiers died in three days in this battle," Steve says, more to fill the silence than anything. "Eight percent of all the casualties in the Civil War happened on this battlefield."

Bucky turns his head and tilts it to the side, asks, "How d'you know all this stuff, alluva sudden? You used to fall asleep in class."

"Sam made me watch a documentary. It was good." He turns towards the road and they keep going until they hit the Angle, then walk down that road and pass many more memorials—the 42nd New York, the 7th Michigan, the 20th Massachusetts—and more or less make a giant circle until the visitor's center is in their sights once again. On the crest of a hill, Steve grabs Bucky's hand to stop him and Bucky, to Steve's vague surprise, doesn't startle; he turns easily and raises his eyebrows like his happens all the time.

Steve isn't sure what he wants to ask, mostly because there's so much he wants to ask— _Why are you remembering so much suddenly? Am I doing this right?_ —but he eventually manages to say, "You seem like you're feeling…good."

The corner of Bucky's mouth quirks up. "I am." He takes a deep breath and looks out over the foggy battlefield. "It's so empty. I feel like there's room for me."

Steve squeezes his hand. "I'm glad."

They walk back to the truck, and Steve forgets to let go of Bucky's hand. Bucky doesn't appear to mind.

_Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen._

* * *

"You want to visit a friend?" Steve asks, when the option to head towards either Pittsburg or Washington is presented to them shortly after getting on the highway.

"Sure," Bucky says, after an obvious moment of conflict. "You sure he'll want me there?"

It's been a year and a half since Bucky ripped Sam's wings and Sam out of the sky, and Sam has forgiven Bucky numerous times for what he did while brainwashed, but Bucky can't seem to get it through his skull that Sam actually enjoys his presence and thinks of him as a friend. Bucky likely doesn't remember the first few weeks of his recovery, when he was still more Winter Soldier than James Buchanan Barnes, and Sam sat next to him on the couch and rubbed his back and talked to him in a low, soothing voice because Steve was so very out of his depth and, between the two of them, Sam was much more qualified.

"I'm sure," Steve confirmed, taking the ramp due south.

They hit traffic about halfway there, so it's almost three hours before they make it to Sam's, double the driving time that it should have taken. It's past midday when they pull into Sam's driveway, almost dinner time in fact. Steve gets out and grabs his duffle bag from the backseat, leaves Bucky's pack with its dubious contents to either be retrieved by its owner or left in the back seat. Steve isn't sure what to make of it when Bucky doesn't even make to grab the bag as he gets out.

Steve hasn't even knocked yet when Sam opens the front door. He looks the same as ever, something cheerful about him that might lie in the quirk of his lips or the size of his eyes or the clean lines of his facial hair. He tries to hide the smirk that emerges onto his face, but lets it show eventually, steps forward to throw his arms around Steve's shoulders. Steve hugs back enthusiastically, glad to see his friend.

"Hey man," Sam says lowly, patting Steve on the back. "Good to see you, real good." When he pulls away, he turns his gaze to Bucky and claps a hand on his shoulder, says, "You, too. You're looking good."

"Feeling good," Bucky says, with a smile that's only slightly unsure. Steve still isn't used to this timid version of his formerly boisterous best friend, but he doesn't dislike it—and there's still hope that, as he regains his memories, Bucky will also regain himself.

Sam leads them into his house, which Steve still has an intimate memory of from the six months he spent living on Sam's good humor after the fall of SHIELD. Feeling like a freeloader even when Sam assured him that he actually liked having Steve around, that he didn't mind a roommate as long as Steve did a few things. Sometimes, when he heard that, he also heard Bucky from seventy years previous: _all you gotta do is shine my shoes, maybe take out the trash_.

This house won't be Sam's for much longer, anyway. He's been planning to move out to New York, plans which are to come to fruition within the month. The house is already starting to show the signs. Pictures that Steve remembers being on the walls are already missing, and some of the smaller appliances in Sam's kitchen—toaster, blender—can now be found in boxes.

"I was just about to start on dinner," Sam says. "I think I have enough for a couple of supersoldiers, but y'all better help me cut up all the veg I'm gonna need to fill you up."

"Sure thing," Steve says, "Just let me put this in the guest bedroom." He gestures to the duffle and then to the stairway, which he knows is just beyond the crook in the hallway.

"Oh, shit. I forgot." Sam turns around, apologetic look already on his face. "I already packed up the guest bedroom. Only thing still up there is the mattress."

"Oh, that's fine," Steve says, waving it away. "I'll take the floor mattress and Bucky can take the couch." It'll be far from the worst thing Steve has slept on.

"No, Steve Rogers. Absolutely not. My momma taught me right and if she found out that anyone was sleeping on the floor in my house except for me, she'd whoop my ass, thirty-five years old or not. And I'd _let_ her."

"Even a WWII veteran?"

"Are you kidding me? _Especially_ a WWII veteran." Sam turns away and continues into the kitchen, muttering something under his breath about _do you even hear yourself when you speak_ —clearly with the intention that they'll hear him, and clearly without any actual spite. Steve got used to it when he was living with Sam, is even somewhat endeared to it at this point, so doesn't backtalk. Even Bucky smiles a little at their friend's antics. In between mutterings, Sam says, "I'll take the sofa and you and Bucky can share the queen in the master. Sound good?"

Steve glances at Bucky, who shrugs before Steve says, "Uh…sure, sounds fine."

"Alright, get in here and help me peel potatoes."

Dinner is steak and potatoes, and Steve and Bucky power through what must have been at least half a sack of potatoes whilst Sam stares, agape, from over his own modest plateful. Afterwards, Steve and Bucky do the dishes for Sam before Bucky heads upstairs to take a shower and go to bed. The two things Bucky has liked doing most since he started his recovery are eating and sleeping, and all signs point to these being good thing things, especially the eating, so Steve lets him be. He grabs two beers and settles on the screened in back porch with Sam, watching squirrels run through his backyard and the citronella candles flicker.

"So how are you doing?" Sam asks. Steve recognizes him settling into councilor mode. Although he's not allowed to be Steve's therapist because of the obvious conflict of interest (And the fact that Steve is not interested in having a therapist in the first place) he still makes a point to make himself available, for shoulder-crying purposes or simple bitching purposes, whenever he and Steve are together. He's a good friend, that way. Possibly the best kind of friend.

In response, Steve rolls his shoulders. Says, "Some days are better than others," because Sam goes out of his way to listen to him, so Steve tries to be as honest as possible when he does. "Last few days have been better. _He's_ been better." He wants to tell Sam about how leaving New York seems to be some catalyst for a massive improvement in Bucky's condition, but he isn't sure how without letting himself get too optimistic. There's an ebb and flow to these things, and Bucky's state of mind could take a header any time. For that reason—and slightly because he doesn’t want to hear Sam say it, as Steve knows he will—he doesn't elaborate.

"That's good. You taking care of yourself?"

"Yes, Mom."

"C'mon, man. You know as well as I do how easy it is to let yourself go when you're taking care of someone like this." Sam sips his beer and leans back against his chair, props his feet up against the small side table that belongs to the set of wicker chairs they're sitting in. Sam has a really beautiful, cozy house, and Steve is going to miss coming here. "Knowing you, I'm sure you've been with him 24/7 since I was in New York last." Sam came out to Brooklyn about three months ago to scout rowhouses and it was, indeed, the last time Steve took a day to do errands without Bucky. "Have you been taking _any_ time for yourself?"

Steve sighs, picks at the label on his beer bottle. "Not as much as I should, I guess, but…I really don't mind being around him all the time. It's how I grew up; it's how I spent a majority of my life until the war started. I didn't really know anything else until Bucky shipped off, and even then…I was only a few months behind him." He sets his bottle down and rubs his eyes, feels the all too familiar sting of impending tears and wonders why it seems like his emotions have been so very close to the surface lately. "I'd never been without him. The last year has been hard, yeah, but…the years before that were even harder. Having him back is like…being able to breathe again. No matter how bad it gets, I can't just leave him. I'd only leave him if he asked me to. I just…" He glances over at Sam, shrugs, and feels his lips wobble as one tear leaks out of the corner of his eye. "I love him, Sam. I love him so much."

"I know," Sam says gently, and clinks his bottle against Steve's. "He's your boy. Your sweetheart. And I really hope that you two can get that back."

"Thank you," Steve says; relieved, as always, to have Sam Wilson in his corner and on his six.

He finishes his beer and goes upstairs to Bucky. He's asleep on his side, hair tied back and, surprisingly, barefoot. Still fully dressed, but it's an improvement. Steve strips down and crawls into bed beside his friend, which he hasn't done since the first weeks of Bucky's recovery, when he needed someone to sleep beside him to make sure he didn't revert to deep programming in his sleep. There is something soft and peaceful about him that Steve hasn't seen for even longer; possibly since they were boys.

He wants to hold him, but he knows that it's a bad idea for so many reasons; including the fact that nobody is entirely sure how much Bucky remembers, and it might be incredibly confusing for him if he doesn't remember the nature of his previous relationship with Steve. That, and it would just be wrong to pressure his still recovering friend into anything he's uncomfortable with or can't consent to. So Steve stays firmly on his side of the bed, turned onto his side with his back just barely brushing Bucky's when he breathes. His warmth is something that can be felt even through the distance between them, and Steve falls asleep easily to the sound of Bucky's soft breath.

* * *

In the morning, Steve wakes up with Bucky in his arms. It feels so good that he almost wants to cry, but he knows he can't stay like this. He starts to pull away before he's even opened his eyes, but there's a gentle pressure on his hip, Bucky's warm hand flat against the apple of his pelvic bone and exerting just enough pressure to get his attention. Steve opens his eyes and Bucky is already staring at him, mouth bowed but not in a frown—in a look of thought, head tilted to the side and eyebrows slightly furrowed.

"What?" Steve asks quietly, a smile sliding reflexively onto his face.

"Would you do something for me?" Bucky asks.

"Sure," Steve says after a moment, because he has to stop his immediate response from coming out of his mouth: _anything_.

That's how he ends up cutting Bucky's hair, sitting behind him on the toilet lid of Sam's bathroom whilst Bucky sits in the tub, trying to remember how they used to do this back in the forties. They got quite good at cutting each other's hair out of necessity because they rarely had two spare coins to rub together and neither of them could go around looking like bums. But it's been seventy years—or roughly five, depending on how you're counting—since Steve has done this, and Bucky never had this much hair back in 1940. He starts by tying it in a low ponytail at the nape of Bucky's neck, cutting off the excess and going from there. Clippings slide down the plain of Bucky's bare back and into the tub, and his hair finally starts to resemble something that looks almost decent. It's shorter on the sides and longer on top, which Steve knows might be a slightly outdated style but it's all he knows how to do. Bucky, anyway, seems pleased when he looks in the mirror after combing it out.

Standing behind him with Bucky's hair clippings in a small trash bag in his hands, Steve cannot believe what he's looking at because…It's like stepping back in time. He hadn't hated Bucky's long hair, but there is no denying that the person standing in front of him is James Buchanan Barnes.

"Thanks," Bucky says, sweeping a hand through his short hair. The sheering of his longer locks has taken five years off him. He looks so young, possibly thanks in part to the heavy-lidded, almost sad doe-eyed look he's been sporting as of late. Steve wants to kiss his pouty bottom lip, the cleft of his chin, each of his eyelids.

"You're welcome," Steve says thickly.

They make breakfast for Sam and then bid him goodbye, only after he's wrangled a promise from Steve that he won't go too long without checking in. Steve assures him that they will be back in New York in time to help Sam move into his new apartment, but is vague about any other questions. Sam, although visibly dissatisfied with the amount of information he's managed to gather, hugs them both before they leave and stands on his doorstep, waving, until they're around the corner.

"So," Steve says, glancing at Bucky—who's wearing Steve's tee and Steve's sweatshirt and has short hair and looks so beautiful, "The Grand Canyon?"

Bucky looks at him and just offers a small smile in return.

* * *

Ohio is possibly the most boring state Steve has ever driven through—and he's driven through most of them, when you combine the USO tour he did in the forties and the cross-country roadtrip that he and Sam accidentally ended up going on to look for Bucky. There is very little to do, except wander around the half a dozen strip malls they go by. Steve suggests going to the Rock N' Roll Hall of Fame, but Bucky shrugs, ambivalent. Steve can't say he cares very much to go, either. The Rock N' Roll era was one they both completely missed, so the attraction holds very little interest for them.

"There used to be this giant statue of Christ on the side of I-75," Steve tells Bucky, as they're driving down one particularly vacant stretch of highway, "People called it Big Butter Jesus because it looked like it was made of butter. They also called it Touchdown Jesus, but I'm not sure why." He glances at Bucky, who's staring out his window. All Steve can see is the back of his head. "Anyway, we'd've gone right past it if it was still standing. Apparently, it burned down back in 2010, before I came out of the ice."

"I know," Bucky says, still not turning away from the window.

"Oh, did Sam tell you?" The burning of Big Butter Jesus was Sam's gleeful offering to the Steve Rogers Mental Library of Odd and Interesting Future Facts.

"No, I know because I was there."

Steve doesn't really know how to react to that. He wants to ask what Bucky means, but going 75 miles on the interstate is not the place to have that conversation. Five miles down the road however, they come upon a rest stop, and Steve pulls in. They're about thirty miles outside of Dayton, and it's about six o'clock in the evening, but Steve feels like the rest stop should at least have someone in it—more than just them, anyway. But they're the only people parked, and there aren't even any trucks in the adjacent parking lot. He and Bucky get out of the truck and frown against the setting sun, but nobody reveals themselves. Steve even jogs up to the building to check that it's open, and it definitely is. He exchanges shrugs with Bucky.

They do their business, even though the need had not been pressing, or at least in Steve's case. After washing his hands, he spends roughly ten minutes, easily eight minutes longer than reasonable, to select a few items from the vending machine and bring doubles of everything back out to Bucky. Bucky, who's sitting on the tailgate of the truck in the setting sun in this oddly deserted but peaceful roadside rest stop, looking relaxed and calm, if not altogether tranquil.

Steve pulls himself onto the hood beside his friend, setting the snacks down between them, and selects a bag of salt and vinegar potato chips first. He eats one, then hands the bag to Bucky. Once Bucky has made his way through half the bag Steve says, "So when you said you were there…"

"I burned down the butter Jesus, yeah," Bucky says through a mouthful of chips.

"Wasn't the butter Jesus located outside a _church_?"

"The church was a front for a Hydra cell. You know that churches operate tax-free, right? And the IRS almost never investigates their spending? A church is the perfect front for a group of evil scientists." He finishes the bag and claps the crumbs off his hands, crumbles the plastic bag and stuffs it in the pocket of the jacket he's wearing. "The cell wasn't operating very well so they tried to consolidate, but a few of the scientists wouldn't go and tried to splinter off. Hydra doesn't like unauthorized heads to sprout, so they activated me. You've seen what I can do. The statue didn't stand a chance. It was just Styrofoam and fiberglass; insanely flammable." He nudges one of the two bottles of coke Steve brought over with a pinkie.

Steve opens it and takes a sip, then hands it to Bucky. There are a lot of things he wants to say in response to that story. He wants to laugh, but he also wants to punch something. He wants to ponder exactly how sacrilegious it is to operate a fascist terrorist cell out of a church. What he ends up saying is, "Everyone thinks it burned down because of a lightning strike."

"Blue energy gun discharge," Bucky says. "From a distance, looks a helluva lot like lightning."

"Huh," Steve says.

He looks at Bucky, and Bucky looks back at him, and just like that they're laughing—guffawing hysterically, both of them, the power of their laughter so strong that they both fall back against the truck bed and gasp for breath. Steve can't remember the last time he laughed like this; feels like it must have been before the war started. It might have been even longer for Bucky. His stomach and lungs soon ache with exertion, but it's so cathartic, so relieving to be laughing, that he can't care.

It doesn't let up for several minutes, and comes back in spurts with eye contact. When they have both finally calmed to the point where they are only releasing small, wheezing chuckles on every third or fourth breath, Steve lolls his head to the side and stares into Bucky's eyes. Steve missed their blue-grey something horrible when all he had to remember his friend by were black and whites.

Soon after coming out of the ice, someone—Bruce, he thinks, but possibly Clint—had suggested that he watch a series called _WWII_ _In Color_ , purely with innocent intentions. He did so, not thinking that they would show any footage of himself or the commandos because he knows that all the footage taken of them was black and white. Unfortunately, this is where he was wrong. An entire episode was dedicated to _Captain America and his Howling Commandos_. There were a lot of things wrong with those recolorings, but none so startling as the fact that they gave Buck _brown_ eyes.

Sitting here, looking into those moonlight gray orbs, he knows that they couldn't have gotten it right even if they knew.

When Bucky reaches out, Steve is surprised and almost flinches, but manages to stop himself. He's rewarded with the feeling of Bucky's palm warm on his cheek, rubbing— _caressing_ —his jaw with the pad of his thumb. Steve closes his eyes and moves his hand up to Bucky's wrist, grabs and squeezes. Exhales shakily. Licks his lips and whispers, "I missed you so much," because he has to let Bucky know.

Bucky nudges closer to Steve, presses their foreheads together. His breath is warm and sweet-scented from the soda, pleasant across Steve's lips. He thinks Bucky might kiss him, but his lips only brush Steve's when he whispers, "I missed you too, bud. More than you'll ever know."

* * *

They stay the night in a roadside motel that they leave first thing in the morning because neither of them were very impressed by the cleanliness. This means that they're back on the road by nine AM and, at last, leaving Ohio by noon. They go down through Kentucky and marvel at the innards of the mountains as they drive through the sections where the interstate cuts through them. When the mountains thin out into hills again, they take a detour onto a side country road and, soon after, come across a small roadside market with a sign out front: _PICK YOUR OWN PECK OF PEACHES– 10 DOLLARS_.

"Peaches?" Steve says, prompting. Bucky makes an agreeable hum, and Steve pulls into the gravel parking lot. There is a young woman, and a man who might be her grandfather, sitting on a pair of lawn chairs under an umbrella at one end of the parking lot, near the sign. They are certainly related; they have the exact same hue of warm brown skin and identical deep, round eyes. Both have a spray of freckles, almost black against their dark skin, across their cheeks. It's not hard to imagine that their lives are spent under this umbrella, smiling at travelers from the interstate.

"You boys wanna pick some peaches?" says the old guy, raising a set of bushy eyebrows—the only hair he has left on his head, aside from an almost-white sprig of hair on his chin. "It's six for a dozen, ten for a peck."

"How many is in a peck?" Steve asks.

"However many you can fit in this basket," says the young woman, reaching behind her lawn chair and retrieving a wicker basket. "It's usually somewhere between eighteen and twenty-four." She hands the basket to Steve and he inspects it for a moment, nods, and hands her two fives. She slides them into a money belt and says, "Thank you. The orchard is about a quarter mile down the road behind us. Keep walking until you hit a gate, then go through. You'll know it when you see it. We've got over a dozen different breeds, so don't feel like you have to pick them all from the same tree."

Steve thanks them and heads off, Bucky on his heels. The road only stays a road for about two hundred feet, at which point it peters out into a grassy path, yellow in the center where people have tread and greener on the edges. There is a fence on both sides that prevents them from wandering off into what is presumably someone else's property. Steve carries the basket under one arm, the other swinging easily. It's a very pleasant day, roughly seventy degrees with a breeze and just enough cloud cover that the sun is not continuously beating down on them.

The orchard is rows of bright green trees, several hundred yards in each direction. Steve doesn't know how to tell any of the different breeds from each other, but he notices that some have larger red spots and some are larger than others. Bucky makes a point to wander as far back into the orchard as he can, and when he returns twenty minutes later, he has two peaches in each hand. Steve isn't exactly sure why he does that, but he doesn't ask. It isn't fair to make Bucky account for every action, and Steve has been trying to stop making him. After all, he's human, that's the point, and humans sometimes do things just because.

They look big and juicy anyway, and Bucky only drops three in, choosing to slice the fourth with a utility knife that he pulls out of his pocket and take a bite out of a small sliver of yellow-orange flesh. When Steve realizes what he's done—taken a bite of something, unprompted and without first watching someone else take a bite, for the first time since coming in from the cold—he can't help the full-face beam that slides onto his face.

Bucky, even though he must know what he's done, raises an eyebrow and mutters, "What?" around the rest of the peach slice, once he's popped it in his mouth.

"Nothing," Steve mumbles, turning his grin down to the basket in his hands, "I'm just…happy."

Bucky takes the basket out of his grasp, sets it on the grass and steps close, cups Steve's jaw with both of his hands and presses their mouths together. Steve takes in a gasp of air through his nose, hands fluttering around Bucky's shoulders, and kisses him back fervently, reverently. They step back a few paces and Steve's back connects with a tree. Bucky's body is solid and warm against his, as they lean against the tree and kiss with closed mouths. Steve can just taste the peach on his lips.

When Bucky pulls away, he has one hand braced above Steve's left shoulder, the other nudging underneath Steve's shirt, hiking it up and pressing warm against his waist.

"Buck," Steve whispers, fingers loose around his neck, feeling the short hairs at his hairline brush his fingertips. He grinds their foreheads together, and can't stop the whimper that sneaks out of his throat. He honestly never thought he would have his again. He would have been happy just having Bucky back, just having his best friend at his side once again. The possibility of having this, of having his lover, is more miracle than he honestly thinks he deserves.

"I know," Bucky murmurs back. "I know, baby."

"I thought you didn't remember," Steve whispers. "You never said anything."

"I didn't," Bucky admits, and now pulls back. Steve does so as well, but doesn't let go. Just lets Bucky go far enough that they can see each other's faces. "Not for a long time. Things have been coming back like crazy since we left New York, though. The first day after we left, I…" Bucky huffs out a chuckle. "Oranges."

" _Oranges_ ," Steve breathes, ardent. He surges forward again, mashes his mouth to Bucky's, nips Bucky's lower lip and sucks until it swells. Bucky gets his hands under his thighs, hikes him up, onto his waist. Steve breaks away to whoop, "Oranges!"

Bucky chuckles, not even struggling to support Steve's weight with only his metal arm as he wraps his flesh hand around Steve's neck. Steve looks down, and all at once Bucky is solemn again, Steve swipes the pad of his thumb across Bucky's cheek, raises his eyebrows in askance. Bucky ki0sses the heel of his hand, whispers, "I don't think I'm ever gonna be alright again, Stevie. I'm better, but I don't think I'll ever be one-hundred percent. I don't know how to be that guy anymore, the guy you fell in love with. I'd understand, I would, if you—"

"Shut up," Steve groans, "shut up, shut _up_." He wiggles around until Bucky sets him down, and it's like being small again, the way his feet arch towards the ground until they're solidly on it again, the friction of his body against Bucky's as he slides down. Once on the ground, he grabs two handfuls of Bucky's shirt, breathes, "You're James Buchanan Barnes. You're Bucky, you're my _Bucky_. I don't need anything else."

Bucky sighs, closes his eyes, presses his head to Steve's chest and then to his stomach, getting on his knees with his arms around Steve's hips, his forehead grinding into Steve's navel. "And you're my Stevie, my baby, oh God. I love you. I've loved you since I was fourteen goddamn years old, do you know that? Don't ever forget that, because that's true." The moment Steve feels wetness on his shirt is the same moment he hears Bucky sob. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

As Bucky cries, long and hard, Steve strokes his hair and lets him. He could assure Bucky that everything is okay, and he doesn't have anything to apologize for, but Steve knows that Bucky needs this cry as much as Steve needed the two dozen or so that he had right after Bucky returned. So he allows him to sob into the stomach of his shirt and, if they're slightly rumpled when they return from the orchard—and if the old man winks at them with a twinkle in his eye that suggests he thinks they were doing something very different amongst his peach trees—then that's fine.

* * *

They get one bed to share in Louisville, but they only sleep. Bucky is dead to the world by ten, flat on his stomach on one side of the massive bed. Steve stays up a little longer, rubbing Bucky's back and listening to him breath even and deep into his pillow and scrolling through news websites on his StarkPad, but not much longer. When he wakes up, his cheek is plastered with drool and sweat to Bucky's bare shoulder blade, the StarkPad is squished between them with a dead battery, and there is someone knocking on the door.

Bucky is up first, before Steve has even manages to groan and roll over. Steve watches him, shirtless with yesterday's jeans slid damn near halfway down his ass. Steve doesn't know if sleeping shirtless was a conscious decision or if Bucky was just too tired to care, but Steve takes it as yet another positive sign. This time last week, he was still sleeping with shoes on.

Steve hears the door hinges open and Bucky huff and mutter, "What are you doing here?" in a gravely, sleep-thick tone, but the person at the door doesn't respond, so it isn't until Bucky stumbles back into the room, trailed by Natasha, that he knows who was at the door.

"Um, hi," Steve says, pulling the sheets slowly up his chest and feeling like he's been caught at something, even though he and Bucky had literally done nothing last night but sleep. "Where did you come from? How did you ever know we were here?"

Natasha leans over to pick up the StarkPad from the bed, says, "You do realize I can track you on anything that carries a GPS, right?" She lets it drop back onto the bed, winds around to the chair in the corner and sits down, kicking her feet up on Bucky's side of the bed. Bucky, disgruntled, mutters, "You talk to her, I'm going back to sleep," before nudging Steve to the side, falling onto his vacated spot, and seemingly falls back to sleep immediately.

"We're just taking a break," Steve explains, picking at the blanket, "We'll be back in New York soon. Am I needed?"

"You don't have to explain yourself to me; you're a grown man, and I'm not your mother." Natasha picks a peach out of the basket they brought in and set on one of the bedside tables, examines it closely for a moment, then bites in. After swallowing, she continues, "I'm also nobody's messenger, so no. I'm not here to give you orders. I was just in the area, decided to stop by." She sinks down in the chair, and stares at the back of Bucky's head for a long minute. She takes another bite of the peach, chews slowly and with her other hand does the sign for _what's up_ , and then points at Bucky. Clint has been teaching all of them sign language, but it's mostly an imperfect vocabulary, heavily skewed towards simple English and combat vernacular. Steve thinks she's trying to ask how Bucky is doing, so he signs back _yes_ because he doesn't know the sign for _ok_ or _good_.

Natasha nods and continues eating her peach. Realizing that he has no idea what time it actually is, Steve reaches over Bucky's head to turn the alarm clock towards himself. Almost 7:30, apparently. The free breakfast this hotel provides has been open for half an hour. Looking back to Natasha, who's now trying to get every last bit of flesh off her peach pit, Steve says, "You hungry? This place has a complimentary breakfast buffet."

She looks down at her peach pit, sucks on her teeth and says, "Sure, why not."

Once Steve has put on a T-shirt over his pajama bottoms—they're full length and at 7:30 AM, he doesn't think he'll be the only one at breakfast in pajamas, if he's not the only one down there period aside from Natasha—they make their way downstairs. The buffet is rather disappointing, although Steve supposes it satisfies the requirements of breakfast. There are cornflakes, cheerios and some colorful kids' cereal along with milk at one end, two trays with eggs and bacon, a waffle iron next to several plastic cups full of batter, and a toaster next to two loaves, one white and one multigrain. There are also some sad-looking Danishes and a variety of bagels on another table, next to a pitcher of orange juice.

They stare at the sad spread for a moment, then Natasha shrugs and grabs a plate, a bagel, and two packets of cream cheese. Steve, because his metabolism basically means he cannot skip a meal without worrying about passing out, grabs a plate and loads it with bacon and eggs, which he powers through with all the enthusiasm of—well, of someone who's trying to meet a certain number of calories with sub-par bacon and powdered eggs.

"I didn't even know they _made_ powdered eggs anymore," Steve grumbles, as he shovels them into his mouth. He chews sadly for a minute, then grabs the salt and loads them with it. As she shakes, he says, "So, was there a particular reason you followed us to Kentucky? Forgive me for not buying that you were _in the neighborhood_. Last I checked, you were in Europe."

"Jeez, Rogers, you're crabby before your second breakfast," Natasha mutters, spreading cream cheese on the second half of her bagel.

"I don't eat _two_ breakfasts," Steve grumbles, even though the caloric intake of his typical breakfast is roughly the recommended _daily_ caloric intake of a particularly active adult man.

"It's a reference to—" Natasha stops and shakes her head, "Never mind, not important. I _was_ in Europe, but I wanted to let you know that there are Hydra cells in Europe making noise again. I don't know if it's a death keel or some attempt at resurgence, but I just wanted to let you know." She takes a few bites of her bagel, and Steve a few bites of his eggs, before she continues, "Barnes looks good," and gives him a look like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.

"Yeah, he's doing good," Steve mumbles.

"Steve," Natasha says, and there's something in her voice that makes him look up and meet her eyes. She tilts her head, expression something soft. "I'm your friend, you know. I'm not looking for something to use against you. I genuinely want to know how he's doing. He's important to me. You both are."

Knowing that he's probably never going to get a more overt statement of affection from Natasha than that, Steve feels flattered and almost warm, and also a bit guilty for being snappy. He swallows his last spoonful of eggs, then says, "He's been feeling a lot better, I think. Been remembering more. Yesterday, he…remembered something really important. So, there's that." He eats a few slices of bacon.

"Then I'm glad," Natasha says.

"Yeah," Steve says, smiling. "Me too."

* * *

Two days later, after hitting Oklahoma, they run into a massive storm. Steve pulls off the interstate, because the rain is coming down so hard that the road is already covered in a thin layer of water. As is usual when you get off the road in the middle of nowhere, there is nothing really around but grass. Steve pulls over to the side of the road and says, "Let's just wait until this passes, alri—"

He's answered by the slamming of the passenger side door. As Steve watches through the water beating against the window, Bucky jogs out into the field and stands there, doing nothing but—as far as Steve can tell—getting wet. His head is turned up towards the sky and his hands are at his sides, and he's just a blurry figure through the water on the window, so eventually Steve gets out, grabs the umbrella he keeps under one of the jump seats in the back, and walks out into the field to meet Bucky.

"What are you doing?" he asks, covering Bucky's head. "You're gonna get soaked."

Bucky turns around and takes the umbrella, folds it up and tosses it into the tall grass, where Steve loses track of it. He rolls his eyes and turns to look for it, but Bucky grabs his wrists, turns him back and pulls him close. When he tilts his head and smiles, Steve can't help but smile back.

"C'mon, Stevie," he murmurs, moving his hands down and intertwining their fingers. "Haven't you ever just stood in the rain?"

"No," Steve says, squinting up at the crying sky, "Not really."

"Neither have I," Bucky says, "so it's a first for us both." He runs a hand through his hair, offers another grin and brushes a kiss across Steve's mouth. When he pulls away, Steve follows him, presses their mouths together again, and feels a small thrill in his stomach when Bucky opens his mouth, warm inside of his lips soft and slick. He slides his tongue into Bucky's mouth, slides his fingers into Bucky's wet hair, opens his mouth wide. Bucky slides his hands under Steve's shirt, whines in the back of his throat.

Steve kisses away from his mouth, down his chin, along his jaw and onto his neck. Bucky's breath grows heavy and irregular, he fists a hand loosely in Steve's hair. When Steve begins to suck a bruise between neck and shoulder, Bucky breathes, "Oh, baby—oh, yes, baby boy—"

Overwhelmed, Steve stops, huffs against his neck, hopes that Bucky can't feel the difference in temperature between his tears and the rain. Of course, he does, and presses his hand to the back of Steve's neck and croons, "Hey, wassa matter? Hmm?"

"Nothin'," Steve sniffs, pulling away and wiping savagely at his eyes, even though rainwater quickly replaces the tears. "I'm just—I keep on cryin', and I dunno why. It'll pass in a minute."

"Hey," Bucky murmurs, turning his face back. He frames Steve's face, swipes his thumbs under Steve's eyes. "C'mon, sweetheart. You can tell me. I ain't gonna say anything, baby. You know I never minded when you cried. It'd be damn hypocritical if I did." He tilts his head, tilts his eyebrows and smiles gently. "Tell me, love, huh?"

"It's just…I forgot, I guess, what loving you was like. How good it felt." He presses their foreheads together. "Not that I ever stopped. I just—forgot." He pulls away and swipes his hand down his face. "I'm sorry, I don't know why this keeps happening."

"Hey, do you see me criticizing you?" Bucky asks.

Steve huffs out a chuckle, meets Bucky's eyes through his fringe and eyelashes. Bucky kisses him slowly, lingering, sweetly. Presses the tip of his tongue against Steve's, warm and intimate, as he slides his hands into Steve's back pockets and kneads his ass. Steve giggles against his lips, pulls back and whispers, "You like something?" He knows the answer, anyway; Bucky's burgeoning erection is obvious against his thigh, a familiar press.

"Mm," Bucky hums, biting his own lip. It makes an electric sensation go down Steve's spine and gather in the small of his back, thickening his cock and drawing up his testicles. "I do, baby, believe me. But—"

Before he even finishes, Steve rushes to say, "That's fine," because he doesn't want to put Bucky through the embarrassment of saying it, and because it really is fine. The last thing he would ever want to do would be pressure Bucky into something he's not ready for. Even if he wants to get on his knees and show this man how much he loves him, right here in this field, he knows that it's just as easy to show his love with his respect.

Bucky kisses him again, and they return to the car and get back onto the freeway, soaking wet and yet warm.

* * *

They are a day, at most, away from the Grand Canyon the morning that Steve opens his StarkPad and sees the headline _California Senator James Morita Dies at Age 101._ He must make a noise, because Buck, who's still half-asleep with his head in Steve's lap, hums inquiringly. Unsure how to say it, he holds the pad where Bucky can see it and Bucky, when he sees it, grunts like he's been punched, sits up with speed and breathes, "Shit."

"Yeah," Steve says weakly. Because he feels he must, he clicks on the link to the article.

James Morita, who served four terms as senator of California—a combined twenty-four years in office—has died at the age of 101 in his hometown of Fresno, California. Senator Morita was California's first and only Asian American senator, and the first Japanese American to serve in the United States Congress.

Morita, who was born in Fresno on February 16th, 1915, was first and most prominently known as a member of the six-man commando group known as the Howling Commandos, who served under Captain Steve Rogers (Captain America) in the European Theatre of WWII. Morita signed up to fight in the war in 1943, after spending a year in a Japanese internment camp. Morita operated as medic to the Howling Commandos, and contributed to the rescue of over 800 men during his three-year service.

In 1942, while in Manzanar War Relocation Center, he met his wife, Doctor Izumi Ito, who would join him in many of his philanthropic and humanitarian pursuits. Senator Morita and Doctor Ito married in 1946, shortly after Morita's return from the European Theatre, then spent the first six years of their marriage living in Japan where they contributed to relief efforts for those affected by the bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima. They would have two children while in Japan, James and Stephen, with a third and final child, Susan, arriving soon after their return to the United States.

Upon returning to the United States, Morita made the decision to run for senator in his home state and won, serving two terms as senator from 1964-1976. Upon the termination of his second term, he chose not to run for a third term and instead left the country again, this time to Cambodia where they lived for four years. There he and Ito, serving as humanitarian ambassadors for the UN along with his grown children, were responsible for bringing a majority of western attention to the actions of the Khmer Rouge and communism. In 1980, a famous picture was taken of his two-year-old grandson Mikado, his son Stephen, and Stephen's wife Kolada, a native of Cambodia, standing in one of the infamous killing fields. The image—below—is often sited as the most iconic image of the genocide known to the western world.

After returning to the United States in 1981, Morita chose to run for senator once again and was reelected for another two terms. In 1994, Morita completed his senatorial career with his twelfth consecutive and twenty-fourth total year in office. He and Doctor Ito would continue their humanitarian efforts, eventually establishing the Morita-Ito Foundation for the Education of Young Women, whose goal it is to build schools in areas where the literacy of young women is systematically neglected. Since its inception, the foundation has raised over six million dollars and has built four schools in Uganda, Nepal, Ghana, and Pakistan.

Shortly after his wife's 1997 death, Morita suffered the first of two strokes and handed the helm of the Morita-Ito foundation to his eldest son, James Morita, Jr. James Morita, Sr. spent the last twenty years of his life in his hometown, visited frequently by his three children, seven grandchildren, and sixteen great-grandchildren. He only left the country once after his wife's death; in May 2005, at age ninety, he attended the dedication of the Izumi Ito Women's Hospital in Phnom Phen, Cambodia.

According to Morita's granddaughter and Mayor of Fresno, Melanie Lee, Senator Morita passed peacefully in his sleep last night from what is assumed at press time to be a second stroke. A public wake is being planned for Tuesday afternoon, whilst vigils are being planned to take place all over California. In lieu of flowers, the family of Senator Morita asks that donations be given to the Morita-Ito Foundation.

Morita was the last of the Howling Commandos to die, ten years after James Montgomery "Monty" Falsworth died in London in 2006, and twenty-five years after Timothy "Dum Dum" Duggan's fatal car crash in 1991. Morita was also the oldest of the Howling Commandos when he died; Montgomery Falsworth was the next oldest at 87, and then Duggan at 77. Tragically, Gabe Jones was only 44 when he died in a Civil Rights protest in 1967, and Jacque Dernier, who was the eldest Howling Commando by some twenty years, was 64 when he died of a heart attack in Lyon, France in 1963. The youngest of the Howling Commandos to die was, of course, James Buchanan "Bucky" Barnes who died in combat in Austria at age 28. A record which was long held by the captain himself when he died shortly before his twenty-seventh birthday, but was given back to Barnes in 2011 when Captain Rogers was famously recovered, live and preserved at age 26, from the 68-year-old wreck in which it was presumed he'd died.

We reached out to many of Morita's family and friends for comment—including his former commanding officer—and, at press time, only Mayor Lee had responded.

Of her grandfather, Lee had this to say:

"Please do not mourn my grandfather; rather, join our family in celebrating his existence. He lived a long, prosperous life by his own terms, and enjoyed every second of it. Now, after almost twenty years apart, he and my grandmother are together again. He finally has a chance to rest, and catch up with friends he hasn't seen in awhile. I believe that he is truly in a better place, and isn't suffering anymore."

_Morgan Stanwick for the Los Angeles Times – contact the reporter_

Steve isn't sure how long he and Bucky sit there, absorbing all of that, after Steve has set down the tablet in his lap. Steve feels vaguely stunned, not only because of Jim's death but because he never realized that he'd _done_ all of that. A feeling of sadness overtakes him, and he only gets sadder when Bucky lowly murmurs, "I guess I didn't realize that any of 'em were still alive."

"I knew Jim was," Steve says, "kept telling myself I'd get out here to see him. Hell, I even knew I probably didn't have a lot of time to do it—he was already ninety-six when I came out of the ice. But things kept happening and…I never did." He draws a hand over his face, shakes his head. "I never even emailed him, Buck. Didn't know how." He settles back against the headboard with a sigh, runs his fingers through Bucky's hair. "I should've made the time. What must he have thought, that I didn't make the time to come see him?"

"Probably that you were too busy saving the world," Bucky says softly. He brushes a kiss over Steve's peck. "I'm sure he understood." He spends a moment picking a pill of the blanket they lie under then says, "Do you want to go to the funeral?"

Steve is tempted, but he shakes his head. Murmurs, "Yeah, but we can't. It's gonna be enough of a media circus without Captain America showing up. Jim's family doesn't deserve that; I won't do it to them."

A deep, dissatisfied noise rises from Bucky's throat. "That's not fair."

"I know, but it's true." He sighs and turns off his pad, sets it on the bedside table and hunkers back down into the blankets, ready to sleep for another three hours even though checkout is in an hour and a half. He and Bucky spend a moment staring at each other, on their sides and with as little distance between them as possible. Steve wonders how he ever got by without this; without the calming hue of Bucky's eyes, staring at him out of that precious, familiar face.

"I have an idea," Bucky says slowly. Steve makes an enquiring noise. "That reporter said she tried to contact you, right? When was the last time you checked your email?"

Steve tilts his head to the side, then admits, "Before we left, I think." He reaches over and picks up his pad again, opens his email. "I don't keep it logged in because the pinging annoyed me." Sure enough, the third email down in his inbox, beneath a few pieces of spam, is an email from _Stanmor@latimes.com_ with the subject: _Statement re: James Morita? (very sorry for your loss)_.

The email doesn't have much substance to it, but Bucky leans over him and clicks through, then clicks _reply_ and types out a message.

"Miss Stanwick," Bucky announces as he types, "Thank you for your email, and my apologies for not replying in time for the article to be published. Thank you for the respectful way you spoke about Jim in your article; I think he'd be very grateful. I'd like to offer my condolences to Jim's family personally, and was wondering if you had the contact information for his granddaughter, Mayor Lee. Thank you, Steve Rogers."

He looks up to Steve with a raised eyebrow and Steve shrugs in response, so he hits _send_ then sets the tablet down, gets out of bed. As he strips down in preparation for getting in the shower, Steve watches him, half-intrigued and half-hard, then asks, "What about the Grand Canyon?"

"If we drive through the day," Bucky says, wrapping a towel around his waist, "We'll hit Fresno by tomorrow morning. The Grand Canyon will always be there, Stevie." He smiles softly and comes closer, presses his lips softly to Steve's. "It might take a while for her to respond to--"

Over the end of his sentence, the tablet pings. Steve picks it up.

_Good morning, Captain Rogers. Thank you for taking the time to respond to my email, and your kind words about my article. You may not know, but Senator Morita was a beloved figure in this state, even amongst those who opposed him. The entire state of California mourns with his friends and family._

_The information you requested is below._

The end of the email lists an email address and a phone number, and Steve hesitates for a moment, considering. He eventually decides that a phone call will be the most direct route, and dials.

A woman picks up, but going by the fact that she answers with, "Mayor Lee's office," Steve can only assume that she is a secretary, and not the woman herself.

"Um, hello," Steve says, thinking about how to approach this. Bucky sits down on the corner of the bed, watching him with something like amusement in his eyes. Steve sighs and leans back against the headboard. "Okay, you're not going to believe me, but my name is Steve Rogers and I'm calling to speak to Mayor Lee about the death of her grandfather. He and I fought in the war together."

There's a pause and then the secretary, wry, responds, "You're right. I'm having a hard time believing you. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. I'll transfer you."

"Thank you," Steve says, relieved.

There's a beep, and a moment of silence, before the line is picked up again. Melanie Lee's voice is soft but not weak when she says, "Steve Rogers, is it? Can I ask you something, just to confirm that you are who you say you are?"

"Yes ma'am."

"What was my grandfather's serial number?"

Steve rattles off the number immediately, pleased that it's something he knows off the top of his head. Mayor Lee is obviously impressed, because she says, "Thank you, Captain Rogers. To what do I owe the pleasure of your call?"

"I'm sorry to hear about Jim," Steve says, "and I'm going to be in California tomorrow morning. I was wondering if I could meet with you and talk? I don't think my coming to the funeral will be a good idea, considering, but I'd like to speak to at least some of Jim's family."

There's a long pause, obviously that of Mayor Lee thinking, then she says, "Alright, yes. I think that's doable. I'm going to give you an address and a time, alright? Hold on just a second." She puts him on hold for what ends up being several minutes, but when she comes back she rattles of an address and signs off the call with, "We'll be expecting you at ten, Captain Rogers. Thank you for your call. Bye."

After she hangs up, Bucky frowns and says, "Who's _we_?"

Steve can only shrug.

* * *

"Are you sure this is the right place?" Bucky mutters, peering out the window at the surrounding suburban neighborhood. "I thought we were going to meet her in a restaurant or something."

"She never said _where_ we were meeting her," Steve mumbles. They got four hours of sleep last night in a road-side motel, and it's more sleep than Steve strictly needs to function for a forty-eight hour period, but it's still not optimal. All he really wants right now is to get out of this car, which it feels like he's lived roughly the last six years of his life in. "Okay, the odd numbers are on your side of the road--keep a look out."

Bucky almost immediately taps his finger against the window. "There. The big blue one."

The house is indeed blue, a calm sort of powder blue, with what appears to be a two-car garage and a half second story. There are several cars already parked in the driveway, and Steve is forced to park the truck on the street. He and Bucky look at each other for a moment, unsure.

"You sure this is the right place?" Bucky asks again.

Steve shrugs. "One way to find out."

He gets out and makes his way up the short walk to the front door. There is a sign on the door that looks to be about fifty years old just based on the artwork. It reads "Welcome!" and features three cherubic children in a rather distinct art style that Steve knows, from his research, is rather distinct to the late fifties. Slightly hesitant still, despite the salutation on the sign, Steve knocks more softly than he typically would.

The answer is immediate, anyway. Only a few moments after he's knocked, the door is unlocked and opened by a petit woman of perhaps thirty-five. She wears glasses and has her short hair combed back away from her eyes. Slim and short, the top of her head only reaches Steve's shoulder. She offers a smile to him and holds out her hand, says, "Good morning, Captain Rogers. I'm Melanie Lee. Welcome to my home."

"Thank you, Ms. Lee," Steve says, shaking her hand. "I…I brought a friend. He's…well, it would be easier to explain if you met him first. Would you give me a second?"

"Sure," she says after a moment, confusion on her face. He turns around and jogs back to the car, pulls open the passenger side door.

"No," Bucky says, tugging back the hand that Steve grabs. "Steve, _no_. I'm going to wait in the car. We agreed."

"I changed my mind," Steve says, tugging again. "Buck, please."

There must be something either on his face or in his tone that convinces Bucky. He closes his eyes, sighs, and slides out of the car. Steve pulls him along by the hand, half afraid that he'll bolt if he doesn't and half to offer moral support. Bucky's grip on him is even harder than his grip on Bucky, so Steve doesn't really feel like he's dragging Bucky anywhere.

On the stoop again, Melanie Lee gets a better look at Bucky and her eyes go wide, then narrow, then wide again. She looks at Steve, opens her mouth, closes it, nods. Holds out her hand to Bucky and says, "Melanie Lee. It's—it's good to meet you, sir."

"You can call me Bucky," he says softly, shaking her hand back. "It's alright."

"Um…come in, please," she says. They follow her through the foyer, down a hallway and into the living room. The room is crowded with people of all ages, from a man sitting in a rocking chair who looks to be in his late sixties or early seventies to a very small infant asleep in one young man's arms. Steve does a quick tally and counts almost forty people. He stands there for a moment, stunned. He feels the rigidity of Bucky next to him, obviously just as surprised and probably much more wary. But they're all smiling, and when Steve looks at them he realizes just how many of them have Jim's soft, compassionate eyes.

"This isn't everyone," Mayor Lee says, "Obviously, because this was such short notice, but this is most of us. There are thirty-eight of us, altogether, including spouses. The oldest of us just turned sixty-nine and the youngest was born three weeks ago." She looks back at Steve, with an expression that is not a smile but is, nonetheless, very gentle and very kind. She sets her small hand on his arm and says, "None of these people would be here today if it wasn't for your actions during the war, Captain Rogers. And this is just my family. Think of all the other men you rescued and freed from Hydra and the S.S. There are probably thousands of people who owe their very _existence_ to you."

"To Captain America," he says softly.

"No, you." A woman sitting in a blue armchair stands up now and draws closer. She's small, just as small as Mayor Lee, and her hair is a long, beautiful cascade of silver-grey.

Mayor Lee says, "My mother, Susan," as an introduction, even though she needs none; it's obvious who she is.

"With all due respect, Captain Rogers," says Susan Lee, "Captain America is a dancing monkey decked out in stars and stripes. My father never stopped talking about you, about what you did for him. I grew up on stories about Steve Rogers. I didn't even know who Captain America was until I was in high school." She reaches down and takes his hand, wraps both of hers around his. "Thank you, Captain Rogers. Thank you for my father."

There is no stopping the tears that fall down Steve's face. He turns his head down and closes his eyes, whispers, "I loved your father. I loved him like I'd have loved my own brother, if I'd had one. I can't explain how sorry I am that I missed the rest of his life."

Instead of replying, Susan wraps her slim, strong arms around him. They just barely manage to wrap all the way around him, but there's something about her embrace that reminds him of being hugged by his mother when he was small; something that he remembers from twenty or eighty years ago. He presses his face into her lavender- and vanilla-scented hair.

"He loved you, too," she murmurs into his ear.

Steve closes his eyes against the flood of emotion that makes him want to collapse. Slowly and gently, Bucky's fingers trail down his spine.

* * *

Mayor Lee—who demands that he call her Melanie in her own home—informs them that they are, under no circumstances, to return to the roadside motel they were staying in the night before, and dispatches two of her nieces to fix up a room. The house, Steve comes to find out, is in fact the childhood home of Susan and her two brothers; the house that Jim and his wife bought after returning from Japan in the early fifties. It is not, thankfully, the house Jim died in; apparently, he'd been living with his eldest son for the last few years, because that house had no stairs. This house is roomy and cozy all at once, with three bedrooms and a finished basement.

Much of the family leaves after lunch, but many of them stay as well. There are so many people that Steve knows he has no chance of remembering all the names, but he does his best. He and Bucky set themselves up in one corner of the living room—Steve thinks most of them know who Bucky is, but are too polite to ask many questions—and enjoy the environment; the atmosphere of being in a room full of people who love each other.

At one point, someone tries to hand off the baby to him, just for a second. He's at once flattered that these people have accepted him so seamlessly into their family unit that they trust him with their infants, and scared immobile by the idea of holding a baby. He was never allowed to handle infants as a young man, either because mothers didn't want their children to catch whatever was afflicting him or because he'd made a name for himself as a troublemaker. Steve doesn't dislike children; he's just suffering from a lifetime of believing that he'll hurt them, in one way or another.

Bucky, however, who helped raise three sisters and who's held more babies than Steve can remember, quickly steps in while Steve is panicking, settles the child in his arms. She doesn't even wake up. Steve watches, half amazed, as the infant stays perfectly asleep as Bucky rocks her. Watches the gentle smile that creeps onto Bucky's face, listens to the quiet cooing noises he makes at her.

"I never understood how you did that," Steve mutters. "I was always afraid they'd go off if I even touched 'em."

"It's a baby, Steve. Not a bomb." He doesn't look away from the baby's sleeping face as he speaks, and adds, "Aren't you? Aren't you just a baby? Just a sleepy baby."

Steve wants to make some kind of joke, something like _No, bombs I can handle_ , but it feels out of place suddenly. With the way Bucky's childhood accent comes out when he talks like that, the way it threatens to make Steve's emotions, so close to the surface these days, boil over once more. He breathes in, knowing he isn't imagining how shuddery it sounds. Whispers, "I wish I'd been able to give this to you."

It might have been possible. Once upon a time, there'd been Peggy, and she'd known the situation, and Steve had loved her. Perhaps not in the exact same way as he'd loved—still loves—Bucky, but then again loves like that are a once-in-a-lifetime thing anyway. Peggy had understood that, and she'd loved Steve enough to accept it. Steve thinks they could have done it. He thinks about it, sometimes; Peggy in a white dress and Bucky standing behind him, handing him a gold ring to put on Peggy's finger. It's a train of thought that inevitably leads to even wilder daydreams; a flock of curly blonde-haired children with Peggy's eyes and nose. That flock of children following Bucky around and Bucky being _so happy_. Never again having to do anything he didn't want to.

It can't happen now. There are too many obstacles. They're too damaged. Their situation is too tumultuous. Steve can barely take care of himself sometimes, let alone a child.

"I know," is what Bucky chooses to say.

* * *

"When I was sixteen," Melanie says to him, apropos of nothing that night—after everyone but her mother, who lives in the house with her, has left, and Bucky has gone to bed, "I had my first girlfriend."

"Oh," Steve says softly, glancing down into his coffee.

"I kept it from a lot of people for a long time," she continues, pushing her glasses up her nose. She's utterly confident, searches for eye contact and maintains it. She has none of the hesitance that Steve thinks he would have, if he were to announce something like that to an almost perfect stranger. "Including my grandfather. He was already eighty years old and I guess part of me was kind of worried that telling him that would give him a heart attack." She chuckles at her own joke and shakes her head. "I'm joking. Mostly. But I was afraid. Even in the mid-nineties, it wasn't something you just announced to people. You had to be really careful about who you told, and even though I knew my grandfather was liberal…I guess I didn't think he could possibly be _that_ liberal. He was from a different time, and they had different ideas of propriety. At least, that's what I told myself. I was dealing with a lot of self-hatred and internalized bigotry at that point in my life."

Steve nods, because even though their adolescent years are separated by almost sixty years, he can relate. Remembers well the literal _years_ of hating himself that he fought through before finding someone to confide in.

Melanie clears her throat and leans her chin on her hand, continues, "When I eventually told my grandfather, it was because my mother asked me to. I thought she was a bit crazy for it but I did it anyway. I just wanted to get it over with, even though I was afraid. Grandpa Jim was always my role model, and my self-esteem would have taken a pretty serious blow if he rejected me."

"Did he?" Steve asks, softly, unsure if he wants to know the answer.

She raises one thin eyebrow and asks, "What do you think?"

Steve chuckles after a moment, feeling somewhat stupid. "That we probably wouldn't be sitting here, talking about it like this, if he had."

"Yeah. He more or less told me that he loved me no matter what, and I cried very grossly, and he laughed at me." She smiles at the memory, staring off into the middle distance. There's something sad in her face. It reminds Steve that the only reason they're here is because Jim Morita is dead and can no longer tell his own stories to the world. "But he told me something. I think I'm the only person he's ever told this to, because he was good about keeping secrets. He had to be; a lot of important people told him their secrets, and he treated them like his own. It's one of the reasons he was so well-liked.

"He told me—and I was never sure who he was talking about, because he never used names, but I had my suspicions and I'm almost certain they're right—he told me that he'd known a man in the army who loved another man, and that their love…that watching them together, witnessing them love each other, is what made him believe that soul mates were real." She offers a small smile. "I started to realize who he was talking about when he told me that those two men died within days of each other…and that he always knew they would, because it was so obvious that they couldn't live without each other."

"Oh," Steve says again, softly. He stares down at the table for a long time. Eventually, he finds the words, "Thank you. For telling me that."

Melanie smiles, and stretches across the table to pat his hand. "You're welcome."

* * *

"We should drive through Las Vegas on the way to the Grand Canyon," Bucky says the next morning, as they're getting back onto the interstate with bellies full of homemade waffles and fresh-squeezed orange juice.

"Why?" Steve inquires, genuinely curious. "There's nothing to do in Vegas but gambling, and you hate gambling." Or, rather, hated the type of man gambling had made George Barnes. Bucky's father's gambling was the chief reason that Bucky spent so much of the Depression working every hour he was allowed—and the reason that his mother and sisters were not always so certain where their next meal would come from. Bucky emerged into adulthood with an almost violent hatred of gambling and the men who did it.

Bucky hums in agreement and is quiet for a moment, then the conversation veers on a completely different path when he asks, "Do you remember Stella Morello?"

"Yeah," Steve says slowly, "Kind of. Short, black hair? Couple'a years ahead of us in school?"

"Do you remember what she did after school?"

"God, Buck, I dunno. It'd been ten years since I'd seen her by the time I went into the ice." He vaguely remembers her having a child shortly after graduation, after marrying the guy she'd been dating all through high school. He thinks there was something odd about the marriage, but he can't quite remember what. Slowly, he says, "All I remember hearing about her is that…she got married and had a kid, same as anyone else. I don't—" It hits him then, what Bucky is trying to lead him to. "Oh! She eloped, didn't she? Yeah, she and Tom-what-his-face from Bed-Stuy—" He goes quiet, takes the moment to loop onto the eastbound interstate, and says, "They eloped to Las Vegas."

He catches Bucky nodding out of the corner of his eye. "Yeah. Hopped a bus one night and came back a week later. Her mother had a holy shit conniption, too, I remember that." He slides down in his chair and rolls his head, and Steve can feel his eyes on the side of his head. "But I was thinking, you know…we should do that. Maybe."

"Elope to Las Vegas?" Steve asks, perhaps somewhat hysterical, but he defies anyone to hold that against him; there is either some serious miscommunication going on here or he's receiving the most roundabout marriage proposal that anyone has ever experienced, and both possibilities deserve a certain amount of hysterics.

"Um…yeah," Bucky says slowly, like he's not entirely sure why the words are coming out of his mouth either. "I just…we can now, y'know? And I always new, back then, that if I could've…I would've." He reaches across the consol, wraps his hand around Steve's over Steve's knee. "And nothing's changed, in that regard."

Steve squeezes his hand and murmurs, "I'm thinking," just so that Bucky knows he isn't being outright rejected. Bucky hums in acknowledgement and the next ten minutes or so of the drive is full of contemplative silence. Steve thinks that this probably isn't how you're supposed to react to a marriage proposal; it's either an emphatic _yes_ or an immediate _no_ and there isn't much room in between. But they've never been conventional in any other facet of life, at least for the last decade or so of their lived years, so he doesn't see why they should start now.

"My main concern," Steve says slowly, "Is that you're saying this because you think it's something you have to do, or because you think it's what I want. Which I do—I'd love to marry you, Buck, that isn't what I'm worried about—but you need to want it to, and not just because you think you should. I mean, you only just got yourself back. I don't want you to rush into any hasty decisions."

"Trust me, bud," Bucky says, returning the squeeze from earlier, "this is the farthest thing from hasty. I've been thinking about this for twenty years. Or almost eighty, depending on how you look at it."

Steve thinks for a moment more, letting that sink in. He'd be lying if he said that he hadn't thought about it before, but not recently—Bucky's recovery has been at the very top of his priorities until very recently and less than a month ago, it was in serious question whether Bucky would ever remember their previous relationship. When he thought about it before, it had the tinge of fantasy—it was something that wasn't possible. Now, looking at it from the perspective of the twenty-first century, it fills him with a pleasant swooping sensation; like the rug has been pulled out from under his feet, but it's somehow a good thing.

"Alright," he says. "Yeah, let's…let's get married."

Bucky grins. "I was hoping you would say that."

* * *

Steve calls Natasha from the parking lot of the 24-hour marriage registration office. The landscape is so incredibly flat that he can see for miles in each direction, which gives it stark contrast to the scenery surrounding the motels they stayed at in Ohio and Pennsylvania, which always seemed to be perched on a hill and surrounded by trees. The last six hours of driving has been full of similar scenery; or lack thereof, as it were. Nothing but red-tinged dust as far as the eye can see.

Natasha picks up on the sixth or seventh ring, just before Steve is sure her phone is going to go to voicemail. She answers with her typical salutation of a slightly-skeptical sounding, "Hello?" like she isn't sure she wants to be talking to him. Steve would take personal offense if it wasn't for the fact that he's witnessed her answer the phone to other people, and knows that this is how she responds to phone calls from everyone. At this point, he's grateful that she doesn't answer the phone to him the same way she does Stark—namely, an immediate bark of _what?_ the moment the phone meets her ear.

"How soon can you be in Nevada?" Steve asks. "Las Vegas, specifically."

There's a pause, then Natasha asks, "Do I even want to know why you're asking me this at…" another pause, "half-past three on a Tuesday afternoon?"

"Uh…" Steve considers how to answer that, glancing around for inspiration. There is literally nothing but the parking lot and Bucky leaning coolly against the side of the truck, arms crossed and sunglasses clinging to the tip of his nose. In lieu of anything better to say, he asks her, "Have you ever been in a wedding?"

"Technically, I've been married five and a half times. Your question doesn't answer mine."

Steve makes the executive decision _not_ to address the first part of her response. "Nevada law requires a witness to receive a marriage license."

"Oh my _god_ ," Natasha breathes down the line.

Steve pauses for a moment to allow whatever emotion she's experiencing to pass before he enquires, "So is that a yes?"

"I'll be there in three hours," Natasha says, "Don't do anything until I get there. I'm serious, Steve Rogers. Don't move a _muscle_."

She hangs up before he can reply, and as he slips his phone back into his pocket he looks over to Bucky and asks, "How literal do you think she was being?" because he knows that Bucky could hear her side of the conversation, enhanced hearing and all that.

"Always hard to say, with her," Bucky says, tilting his head back. Sometimes, Steve forgets that Bucky and Natasha have some kind of history together that neither has been forthcoming about. Sometimes, Steve also forgets that Bucky looks strikingly beautiful when the sun hits his hair in just the right way to bring out the red undertone to his hair. "But you did just tell her that you want her to be a witness at the wedding of Captain America and the Winter Soldier, so I'm going to go out on a limb here and say _pretty darn_." He's quiet for a moment, a slight smile on his face that says he's either enjoying the breeze or that he's smug about his comeback—or both, which is always a viable third option with Bucky. Then his smile grows three times wider, seemingly spontaneously. He reaches into his pocket. "Speaking of, I saw something inside that I thought you might enjoy."

The pamphlet that Bucky hands him is blue with red and white stripes along the top and the bottom. In the middle is a cartoonish rendering of his cowl and shield framed by the words _GET HITCHED BY CAP_. Both incredibly apprehensive and morbidly curious, he opens the pamphlet. Inside is mostly booking information, but there is also a picture of a man who might, if you squinted and tilted your head to the side in a dimly-lit room, resemble Steve.

"Oh my God," Steve mutters, eyes wide. "You can't be serious."

"There's one for the whole team," Bucky informs gleefully. His smirk slips slightly when he adds, "Well, aside from Natalia."

"Even the Hulk?" Steve mutters, turning over the pamphlet. Along the back, there is a list of the other impersonators the company offers. The list is a very long and eccentric one; apparently, in Las Vegas, you can get married by anyone from Chewbacca to Billy the Kid.

"Oh yeah," Bucky says. "The girl at the desk told me that he's the most popular. Aside from you, of course."

For a moment, all Steve can envision is the Hulk standing squished between them at the alter, declaring, "HULK PRONOUNCE YOU MARRIED." He shakes it from his head.

"And here I thought it was just Elvis," he says.

"Who?" Bucky mumbles.

That's how they end up spending the next three hours watching old recordings of the King of Rock N' Roll on Youtube, eating frozen yoghurt and sitting in the parking lot of the 24-hour marriage registration office. It's not exactly how Steve thought he would spend his wedding day, true enough, but he doesn't think he would trade it for anything in the world at this point.

* * *

Natasha arrives in a sleek, green rental car. She emerges from it, big sunglasses and hair pulled back into a springy ponytail. She closes the car door, leans back against it with her arms folded. "You're not planning on getting married by Elvis, are you?"

They chuckle helplessly, Steve sliding down in his seat and putting his hands over his face "No. We just want to get married."

"Well, you're in the right place for it," Nat says. "Let's go get your license."

There is quite a lot of paperwork to fill out in order to get a marriage license. He, Bucky and Natasha sit folded into the uncomfortable chairs for nigh on an hour, trying to fill out the paperwork in a way that sounds least suspicious. Bucky has a state ID, identifying him as James Barnes, but it also lists him as being born in 1980. Meanwhile, Steve's ID lists his actual birth date. Eventually, they choose to put down the truth.

The clerk, a woman in her mid-forties wearing a cardigan and glasses on a chain first spends several moments staring pointedly at the top of their join application form, where they have listed their birthdays as being July 4th, 1918 and March 10th, 1917. Then she looks at them, over the rim of her glasses and says, "You're 98 years old?"

"Not until July," Steve says, offering a strained smile.

The clerk rolls her eyes, sets down the paper. "Look, contrary to popular belief, we won't give a marriage license to _anyone_ in Las Vegas, and falsifying information on a marriage application isn't a joke."

"That information is true, ma'am," Steve says, trying to keep the polite tone to his voice. "My name is Steve Rogers, I was born in 1918 in Brooklyn—"

"You need to leave," the clerk says flatly.

Steve glances over his shoulder at Natasha and Bucky, helpless. Natasha shoulders him out of the way and stamps her hands down on the desk and leans in, says, "Hi, Kathy. You see that computer there? Do you have internet on it? Good, could you do me a favor and search Captain America, please?" She reaches behind her and pulls Steve to her side, removes the glasses and hat he's been wearing, and waits for the clerk to complete her Google search. When she does, she looks up and her face goes from exasperation to astonishment, and then—after darting her eyes between the screen and Steve's face for a moment—rapidly reddens in embarrassment.

"Captain Rogers," she stutters. "I'm so sorry."

"It's alright," Steve says, clearing his throat. He's starting to realize just how public this entire thing is. As soon as his name came out of Natasha's mouth, they gained an audience, and now he can see phones being pointed in his direction out of his periphery. Tomorrow's headlines flash through his mind: _Captain America Marries a Man?_ "Can we just get this over with?"

"Uh-um-yes," stutters the clerk. She taps out a frantic rhythm on her keyboard. "Just let me put the information in the—uh—in the system…"

The clerk gets up and rushes into a backroom, then reemerges with a printed paper in hand. She fills out the relevant information, then sets it on the desk and says, "Your witness needs to sign—"

Natasha does so, and then the clerk herself signs, hands them the paper and says, "This document needs to be signed by the officiant of your ceremony and then filed with the state of Nevada within thirty days, or the license is void. Any name changes won't be official until you notify the relevant authorities, but you would need to sign the certificate with your married name upon completion of the ceremony." As she says all of this, she's glancing nervously between Natasha and Bucky, both of whom have stormy expressions.

"Thank you," Steve says, accepting the certificate from her.

"Don't tell anyone about this," Natasha says casually, lowering her sunglasses over her eyes once again. "If I see the news reporting on the name of Captain America's new husband, I'll know it was you who leaked it. You don't want that."

With that, she leads the way out of the office. Steve follows meekly behind, like a child after his mother, and waits until they're standing outside to ask, "Did you have to threaten the clerk?"

Natasha simply looks at him and raises her eyebrow. Steve sighs, drags a hand over his face. Natasha says, "Come on, let's go get you two married."

* * *

A Little White Wedding Chapel is located at the far end of the strip, and isn't very busy at all at six PM on a Tuesday. A short strawberry blond woman wearing a white robe and red sash marries them outside in a gazebo with the sounds of the strip ringing in their ears. Natasha stands off to one side and either browses the internet or takes pictures, it's hard to tell. Steve gets married to his best friend wearing a T-shirt, hooded jacket and worn pair of jeans. He can't stop grinning.

Afterward, Natasha takes them out to one of the buffets. The general buffet price is 40 dollars, which Natasha pays. Steve has never seen so much food in his life and while he can't decide if he's impressed at the variety or disturbed at the excess, it doesn't stop him and Bucky from putting away four plates each. When they're done, Steve feels vaguely like he feels the casing of a sausage might, and from the way Bucky is rubbing his belly next to him, he figures they're in the same boat.

It was all amazing, though.

"Oh, by the way," Natasha says, pulling a small envelope out of her purse and setting it down on the table between them, "I got you something. Congratulations."

Steve picks up the envelope curiously, slides it open and tips its contents into his hand. Two keycards fall out, each featuring a picture of the front façade of the New York New York hotel. Steve's eyebrows shoot for his hairline as he looks back up at her, asks, "Exactly how much did this room cost?"

"Technically, it didn't cost me anything," Natasha says, flashing the black AmEx in her wallet.

"Does Tony know you have his card?"

"Tony gave me this card  a few years ago for incidental expenses," Natasha informs as she refolds her wallet and tucks it back into her purse. "He says that he offered one to you too, but you didn't accept. I'm much more of an opportunist. The room number is written on the back of that envelope. You have it for two days. I bought you a honeymoon package, whatever that means. I think they just prestock the room with condoms and bath bombs." She swings her purse over her shoulder. "Anyway, have fun. Congratulations again."

"Nat," Steve says, catching her elbow. "We—it's not—we can't accept this. It's not something we need." He doesn't want Bucky to feel pushed into anything, or to somehow think he's obligated to do something because of the circumstances.

"Just let yourself relax, Rogers," Natasha says, lowering her sunglasses over her face, even though the sun has begun to set outside. "It's your wedding night." Then she's off, migrating rapidly through the crowd until her bobbing red head can't be seen anymore.

Steve's gaze returns to Bucky. His gaze is heavy, lids slightly lowered into a look that Steve assumes to be caused by tiredness. It's been a long day, and they haven't had very much sleep in the last 72 hours. He reaches down and grips Bucky's hand, squeezes and says, "Well, we have a hotel room. Might as well use it."

Bucky looks down at their intertwined hands, and it takes Steve a moment to realize that he's staring at the new presence on Steve's ring finger; the thin gold wedding band whose unfamiliar weight is a constant tug on the back of his consciousness, a reminder of what they've done today. Steve smiles and runs his thumb over Bucky's knuckles. Bucky says, "Lead the way, Cap," and he does, sliding out of the booth and walking with Bucky out onto the strip, pressed shoulder to shoulder.

* * *

There is indeed a massive goodie basket on the table in their suite. It's not as big as Steve was thinking it would be, although he's relieved at that rather than disappointed. It's simple, all things considered. Steve was envisioning a heart-shaped bed with red stain sheets and mirrors reflecting all angles, but it's a rather normal room. The bed is massive, but clothed in a set of soft pink sheets rather than lascivious scarlet. There is a Jacuzzi tub in one corner, and that is surrounded by mirrors. It's huge and deep. The aforementioned goodie basket is mostly bathing supplies, oil and bubble bath and a few things designated as 'melts' which supposedly dissolve on contact with the water.

Of course, in the bottom of the basket there are condoms. Also a variety of lube packets in different colors and scents and—in some cases—flavors.

"How much sex do they think we'll be having?" Bucky mutters as he stares at the condoms covering the bottom of the basket. There are easily thirty.

"Well, this is the _honeymoon_ suite," Steve chuckles. He walks away from the basket and further into the room, comes to rest against the window and stares down. They have a nice view of the Strip, the darting lights of cars and displays. He sees Bucky's reflection as he comes up behind him, and hums with content when Bucky's arms come around his middle, firm and warm. The metal one is not cold, as Steve might have thought before. He breathes, "Hey you," and brushes his fingers over Bucky's hands, grateful beyond words to have this man here with him; to have done with him what they've just done. To have had the chance.

Bucky presses a kiss into the side of his neck. Steve isn't able to hold back the shiver than goes through him at the sensation. He says, "Hey yourself," and moves his hands up underneath Steve's shirt, trails his mouth along the dip of his shoulders and to the other side of his neck, brings an earlobe into his mouth and sucks.

Steve tilts his head to offer better access, gasps raggedly. His hands find Bucky's forearms and squeeze. He whispers, "We don't have to—if you don't—"

"Rogers," Bucky says, in a low growl that floods between Steve's legs with liquid arousal, "It's my wedding night. I don't care what those fuckers did to me, I'm not gonna let it get in the way of this. I'm tired of letting them win. I'm not letting them win anymore." He moves his metal hand down to unbutton and unzip Steve's jeans; the other ducks down the back. Steve groans, spreads his legs and whimpers when Bucky rubs two fingers against him.

"Bucky," he whispers. He loops his hand around the back of Bucky's neck and holds on. "Oh God…"

"You like that, baby?" Bucky whispers.

"Mmm-hm. Yes, yes—"

"I'm gonna put you on your back and eat your ass 'till you can't remember your name," Bucky croons. Somehow, he's always had a way of making the absolutely vulgar sound unbearably sweet. "Then I'm gonna screw you so sweet, baby. Oh baby, I'm gonna make _love_ to you like you've never been made love to before." He pulls away and crosses the room to the basket. Steve, who can still feel the pattern his fingers were rubbing out and whose breathing doesn't seem interested in slowing down, totters on shaking legs to the bed and begins to strip, starting with shoes and socks.

Then there's Bucky, and he returns with an almost tender look on his face as he nudges Steve up the bed and pulls down his pants, planting open-mouthed kisses on his cheekbones and thighs. Steve starts shuddering when Bucky's hot breath coasts across the inside of his thighs, fists one hand in the sheets and one in Bucky's hair. Bucky hikes one of his legs over his shoulder and then Steve feels his mouth, warm and wet.

He groans. Bucky hums in encouragement, soothes his palms over Steve's hipbones. Steve looks down between his legs, sees Bucky's eyes closed and the flush high on his cheeks, sees those big hands fanned out against his skin, one silvery in the low light and the other almost-brown, Bucky's dark Black Irish skin creating heady contrast with Steve's peach-pink-pale complexion. The gold ring on Bucky's right hand.

"Spread your legs a little more for me," Bucky murmurs, gruff like he can't quite make his tongue work right. Steve kicks off his jeans, which until now had been hanging off one ankle, and bends his knees up towards his chest. Bucky's strong hands move up and cradle his thighs, supporting them and spreading them at once. Steve gasps, as he always has, at Bucky's strength; even if he probably now has equal if not greater strength, he thinks part of him will always think of Bucky as stronger, sturdier.

"There you go," Bucky breathes, "God, baby, you're so pretty."

Steve drops his head back against the pillows and flings an arm over his eyes. Things go fuzzy after that.

* * *

"Stevie?"

"Hmm?" Steve murmurs into the dark, half-asleep and warm in the cocoon of blankets and Bucky's skin. They're messy and sweaty. Steve can feel Bucky's seed cooling between his thighs. He's too tired to bother with cleaning up. This bed is arguably the best thing that's ever happened to him, aside from the man in it with him.

"I just…I wanted to tell you, 'cause I think you should know…I can't always…what happened tonight, I can't always do that. Sometimes—sometimes I can't…can't get hard, and other times I can but…but I can't get _off_ , y'know." He goes quiet for a moment, and Steve can feel him pulling inside of himself, getting small and distant. Steve turns over, clumsy with sleep and post-coital lethargy, uses his arms to keep Bucky close. Bucky lets out a shuddery breath, whispers, "I'm sorry. I shoulda told you before we did that. Got married, I mean. Nobody wants to buy broken goods."

"You're not broken," Steve whispers, smoothing a thumb along Bucky's cheek—wiping away the moisture he finds there. "At least, not in any way that can't be fixed."

"What if I can't be?" Bucky murmurs.

"I'll still want you," Steve tells him, scooting forward until he can press his forehead into Bucky's. "I'll always want you."

Bucky's breath is warm and reassuring on his face. He moves his head down and tucks it under Bucky's chin, and falls asleep like that. Bucky's fingers trace a gentle pattern on his back.

* * *

They reach Grand Canyon National Park at sunset. They park the truck in a lot not far from the Amphitheater, and walk towards it with the colors of the canyon rising all around them. The orange of the setting sun makes the colors of the canyon even more vibrant and vivid, and Steve can do nothing but stare with his mouth open for several minutes. He's seen pictures. It's nothing like the pictures. There is no picture that could capture the magnitude of this landscape.

"It's so much bigger than I ever thought it would be," Steve whispers—they're the only ones in the amphitheater, and yet he still feels like he needs to speak in the quietest of hushed tones. Like speaking too loudly would disturb the wonder.

Bucky doesn't say anything. Steve watches as he walks to the edge of the canyon, then sits down. He dangles his feet over the edge, hundreds of feet from the canyon floor, and leans back. Braces himself on his arms and stares up at the setting sun, the wind blowing in his hair. Steve isn't sure what he's doing, but he's relatively certain that this is part of Bucky's catharsis. He sits down on one of the tiers of the amphitheater and lets Bucky do what he will.

This continues for what might be as much as half an hour. Then, Bucky abruptly rises from his seat and heads off. Before Steve can even really think to follow, Bucky is already returning—lugging the duffflebag that he hasn't touched, not once, since they got to Sam's house weeks ago. He returns to the edge of the canyon and Steve watches as he bends down and picks unzips the bag.

It's full of manila envelopes and loose pieces of paper. With a jolt, Steve realizes that this is Bucky's biography; all of the files that Hydra kept on him, from finding him in the Alps in 1945 to the fall of Hydra a year ago. The extensive history of the Winter Soldier, as well as all of the information they could gather on Hydra's programming. Stunned, Steve watches as he picks up a particularly large folder, lights the corner on fire with his cigarette lighter—which Steve has seldom seen him use since they started on this trip—and drops the flaming envelope on the duffle. After a moment, visible flames grow out of the bag.

Steve gets up and gingerly approaches. The bag is perched precariously on the edge of the canyon, Bucky a few feet back. Steve stops about a foot behind him, but Bucky reaches back, finds his hand and holds on. Steve squeezes back.

The heat from the fire is enough to dry out their eyes from several feet away. With so much paper, the entire thing is engulfed in moments. It burns for twenty minutes as the sun gets until the world around them is blue-tinged twilight. Steve's palm starts to sweat against Bucky's, but he doesn't let go. If anything, he gets closer; he nudges his nose against Buck's neck and closes his eyes and presses a short, sweet kiss to his jaw muscle. Bucky's thumb traces over his hand, and the duffle bag burns.

When the entire thing is nothing more than a smoldering pile, Bucky lets him go, takes two enormous steps back, and takes a running start to kick the thing off the edge. It flies about twenty feet into the canyon before its forward momentum is exhausted and it just starts to fall. Steve strains to hear the thump of it hitting the bottom, but he isn't sure if it ever comes.

"I have a question," Steve says finally, hands buried in his jacket pockets to guard against the nighttime desert chill. "You don't have to answer if you don't want to."

"Hm?" Bucky mumbles, returning to him. They lean towards each other, each taking a bit of the other's weight.

"Did you bring your files with us intending to burn them and then kick them off the side of the Grand Canyon?"

Bucky chuckles under his breath and turns his head, rests his chin on the apple of Steve's shoulder. Steve turns his head and looks into Bucky's eyes, the only part of his face he can really make out when he's this close. Bucky says, "No. I brought them because I thought they were safest with me. Then I realized that nobody, least of all me, was safe while they still existed. I could've just burned them on the side of the road anywhere from here to Hoboken, but this just seemed more appropriate somehow." He sighs and presses his face against Steve's shoulder, hand coming up to press against Steve's stomach. "Steve?"

"Hmm?" Steve murmurs, pressing his nose into Bucky's hair.

"Let's go home."

Steve smiles against the crown of Bucky's head, whispers, "Alright."

They turn around and head back to the truck, and go home.

**Author's Note:**

> I will neither confirm nor deny Hydra involvement in the burning of Big Butter Jesus. I'm sure that it was through the actions of some nefarious plot, however, because that statue was the only thing that brought me joy on my numerous drives through Ohio.  
> Also, no offense to anyone from Ohio, but your state is just a little bit boring to drive through.  
> I also would not recommend chucking a burning duffle bag off the side of the Grand Canyon. Sounds like the kind of thing that can get a person arrested.  
> Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
